Major Buckstone also caught the sound. He looked at his commanding officer inquiringly.
“It was necessary,” replied the governor, dryly. “A great deal of time had been wasted, you know.”
The bluff major seemed stung by this and was about to reply; but Gage’s upraised hand silenced him. The general gave Ezra his attention once more.
“I would hesitate in ascribing any motive to your actions that would be to your discredit,” said General Gage; “but in the face of this answer, what else can I do? Some time since, before that unfortunate occurrence at Lexington, I recall that you tried to be of some service to me, Master George. And your grandfather tells me, though reluctantly,” with a twinkle in his eyes, “that there have been numerous other things you have done to serve the King. But he tells me that you have had queer notions—mixed feelings—odd ways of showing your loyalty.”
“He has always had too much regard for the colonies,” said Seth Prentiss, and from the expression of his face this was nothing short of a crime. “He has done, it is true, many things that helped our cause,” continued the old merchant. “But he has done them because he thought it the best way to serve the colonies. The King was never in his heart.”
There was a pause. The rumble of the guns rolled across the city; the red flashes became incessant in the sky. And as they grew in volume and frequency, so did the good humor of General Gage increase.
“So long as he has served the King’s cause,” said the commander, “it matters but very little what his reasons were. But this affair of the dispatch is different.”
Here Gilbert Scarlett cleared his throat.
“If I may speak a word,” said he, and he bowed elaborately, “I will say that I see no great difference in what has already happened and what is happening now.”
“If the youth has had odd and curious ways of performing his services in the past,” said the soldier of fortune, “is it any matter for wonderment that he should have them in the present?”
“Why,” said Gage, apparently much struck by this reasoning, “what you say has the ring of philosophy.”
He tapped the edge of the table with his finger-tips for a moment. He was a good-natured man when things were working smoothly; and he showed it now.